Code-switching Is Much More than Careless Mixing: Multilinguals Know the Rules!

The reactions a few weeks ago on the Multilingual Living Facebook page to the post Language Switching with Your Bilingual Child When It Counts show that multilinguals are familiar with code-switching (the use of more than one language in a conversation, or even within a sentence and sometimes even in a single word). The question is, do people think that code-switching is something to be proud of? What do you think? If we were to ask a group of multilinguals, the general response would most likely be negative.

People who switch back and forth from one language to the other are considered careless, thoughtless, clumsy, not interested or disrespectful towards their languages. However, a lot of interesting observations can be made from this! For the next few months, I will be writing posts for Multilingual Living about how academic knowledge can help us understand our daily multilingual lives. This post on code-switching is the first.

WHAT is code-switching?

If you don’t know what code-switching is, listen to the child in the following video:

Less decent but just as much code-switching can be heard in the following video:

Linguists who study code-switching may ask two types of questions which I will return to below.

The first question is: WHY do people switch? And that has everything to do with identities, proficiency, situation, speech partners, etc.

The second question is: HOW do people switch? And that is a more grammatical topic.

WHY do people code-switch?

Have you ever heard an official speech in which code-switching occurred? Probably a single word every now and then, but not more than that. Obviously, when we try to speak with great care, when we want to make a well-prepared and educated impression, we do our best to stick to one language. But usually, in our day-to-day contacts, we are not very careful and we don’t pay special attention to how we say things, as long as our message is clear.

People who switch a lot between their languages in bilingual encounters will not do so with speech partners who understand only one of their languages. It does not make sense to use, say, Turkish with a speech partner who does not speak or understand a word of Turkish.

Some linguists have stated that ‘true’ code-switching is only possible when a speaker is fully proficient in two (or more) languages, or a ‘balanced bilingual.’ But how many people are equally native-like proficient in two or more languages? Not many, I would guess. But that does not mean that they are unable to switch between languages!

Sometimes people switch when they don’t know a word in one language. Most multilinguals have a ‘better’ language, but it all depends on the topic and speech partners.

Sometimes people switch because they want to show their speech partners that they also know the other language, or because it ‘sounds better’ in the other language.

A Turkish/Dutch girl I know told me that she curses in Dutch and not in Turkish because in Turkish it would sound more serious, more severe. When a Dutch-Arabic bilingual living in the Netherlands wants to talk about Islam, (s)he will prefer Arabic, but when (s)he talks about school, Dutch is preferred. The same person might feel uncomfortable speaking Dutch to his or her parents and Arabic to friends.

When I talk with an Arab in the Netherlands, we might both use Dutch and I might sometimes use some Arabic words in order to identify myself as a person who knows some Arabic, even though my Arabic is very poor. Code-switching identification is a powerful tool for identification.

HOW do people code-switch?

Codeswitching within sentences is not something people do whenever they feel like it!

Whenever switching takes place within a sentence, there are strict grammatical rules to be obeyed. Nobody told the bilinguals what these rules are, there is no book or grammar that prescribes when and how to switch, and yet bilinguals know these rules!

People who switch within a sentence have to know the grammar of both languages. In English, for example, the verb comes right after the subject. In Turkish, but also in Dutch and German subordinate sentences, the verb is the last word of the sentence. So when you want to switch from English to German in a subordinate sentence, and you already used the verb in English (and you don’t want to violate either grammars), you have a problem, as in this example:

I leave it to the German-English readers to come up with a solution. Where would you switch from one language to the other in the sentence above without making grammatical errors?

Even when there are no word order difficulties such as those listed above, you still can only switch at certain points, not randomly. For example, switching after every second word as in examples (5) and (6) below leads to impossible sentences. (Sentences (3) and (4) below are the monolingual equivalents.)

Sentence (5) and (6) are simply wrong. Bilinguals just would not say something like that. However, the next two sentences sound much more acceptable:

(7) Ik kocht the last copy
(8) I bought het laatste exemplaar

People who never learned what a ‘subject pronoun’ or a ‘finite verb’ is, know exactly that switching between a subject pronoun and a finite verb, as in (5) and (6), is unacceptable in bilingual speech. Isn’t that amazing? They also know that code-switching between finite verb and direct object is less problematic, as in (7) and (8).

These examples were from English, Dutch and German. However, the rules like the ones above apply to all possible language pairs which means that all bilinguals, whatever their languages, know these rules. And not only between spoken languages but also between spoken and signed languages. Deaf people are also able to switch between sign language and a spoken language, and they do so when they are communicating with other bilingual speaking/signing people.

Now the question asked in the beginning can be answered:
yes, code-switching is a skill and a strategy and it is something to be proud of!

Jacomine Nortier is associate professor in multilingualism and sociolinguistics at the Utrecht Institute of Linguistics, Utrecht University, the Netherlands. She teaches at all university levels. According to European norms she is a monolingual, i.e., she grew up with Dutch as her only language, but like all Dutch children she learned English, German and French at school and she communicates in all three of them. As a university student she learned the Scandinavian languages Danish, Norwegian and Swedish, and later she learned Moroccan Arabic as well. Her PhD thesis (1989) was about code-switching between Dutch and Moroccan Arabic. More recent publications are about code-switching and increasingly about urban youth languages, multi-ethnolects and multilingual internet forums. Over the course of the next few months she will be writing columns for Multilingual Living about how academic knowledge helps us understand our daily multilingual lives.

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I just wanted to make the point that there is “code-switching” and “code-mixing”. I think code-mixing fits better when discussing the strategies people use to fill their linguistic gaps or grammatical shortcomings. Code-switching seems to me to have a more social element to it, being a fluid re-negotiation of relations when participants are multilingual and know each other to have a mutual language repertoire.

@Rachael, I always try to avoid the discussion on switching/mixing. In the literature mixing is often seen as something more grammatical (intrasentential) than switching (cf, e.g., publications by Auer and Meisel). And then there is code-alternation as well. And code-copying (Johanson). To me it seems (sometimes) that switching is the process and a mix is the result. But I know, understand and accept that there are many other options and choices, much better than mine. so many that I prefer not to get involved into that discussion. Not here, at least.

People from Gibraltar code switch and mix constantly. The whole native population mixes English and Spanish, usually within the sentance. I listen for the code switching rules, which obviously exist, but they are hard to distinguish from the outside. Yet when I asked a Gibraltarian friend about it she said, “I don’t know, its just how we talk.” More than bilingual, she is a native code-switcher. That’s the community language in Gibraltar. (I’d like to post about this for the next carnival)

Yes, there are communities where code-switching is the unmarked way to communicate. The term is from Carol Myers-Scotton. My colleague Melissa Moyer from Barcelona (among others) has published on code-switching in Gibraltar. It is just a coincidence that the great linguists were/are monolinguals. Otherwise we would have been surprised that there are communities where monolingualism is the norm!

I`m so glad I found this article. Always when I switch between Polish, English and German I feel bad. I have a feeling that I should stay consistent in one language: speak to my son in Polish (my mother language) and to my husband in German (he is German) and we live in English speaking country.

You must be a skilled code-switcher! I am sure you know when to speak what language: in a English shop you won’t speak Polish or German! A few years ago when I was preparing a (Dutch) book, I sent out a questionnaire about multilingualism among some multilinguals with questions like ‘what do you see as advantages of being multilingual?’. Some people replied:”’Being able to code-switch!’

Very interesting article. It is amazing how children pick up the grammar of their language therefore making code switching seem so “normal” even if the grammar is all mixed up. (My kids are bilingual french-english) Thanks for the additional food for thought.

Thanks for this article. As a from-birth bilingual, I code switch all the time! So do my two bilingual kids (14 and 4). I am also a bilingual speech therapist. I was really enlightened by Jocamine’s response to Rachael about the difference between switching and mixing, which she says is “something more grammatical (intrasentential)”. I don’t see any problem with mature speakers or children engaging in code switching or mixing as they learn the two languages. I just wonder what happens when the only language model to which the child has access is a random mix of two or more languages. As Jocamine states, ” People who switch within a sentence have to know the grammar of both languages…”. How is that possible if a child developing language never has whole sentences in one language or the other modeled for them? To me it flies in the face of reason that a child will know the grammar of both languages well if neither one is ever modeled in isolation. While I’m all about encouraging families to be multilingual, I think we do a disservice to everyone if we pretend that it makes no link between the quality of the language model and the language outcome for the child. Families just need to be clear about what their expectations are and clearly link that with what they do at home. If you live in Gibralter (like the example above) and plan to stay there, then mixing will serve you well. If you want to be able to speak (and maybe read and write) at a level that allows you to connect with monolingual speakers of either or both languages, it would be wise to think about the connection between language input and language output.

Isn’t it the case that children have contacts outside their homes as well, where people may be monolingual or more dominant in one of their languages? Or when they watch tv, etc. Languages serve different functions. And in codeswitching or mixing, it is not always, or almost never the same part of a sentence that is affected. Which means that all parts of sentences are presented in L1 and in L2. Furthermore, I think codeswitching does not happen (with-)in every single sentence.
These are just some reasons why I think that also from bilingual input children are able to derive the rules of their (separate) languages. The problem maybe smaller than it seems (which does not mean that I deny the existence of it). I share your concern but I think these situations are really very rare.

It is probably not a coincidence that the 2 people conversing about this (Charity and I) are both from the U.S.; to answer your first question – no, in the U.S. if you are teaching your child French or German or Spanish at home that is often the only place they are hearing it. There are exceptions to this along the Southern border (if you speak Spanish at home) but the US is a big place and in most areas and very monolingual (sadly). As for TV, I don’t think it is a very good language teacher; I think it may be an ok supplement but it seems that children use a person’s face and body language in real time to learn language effectively.
Your point about the fact that the same part of the sentence isn’t always affected by mixing is a good one. I’ll have to give that some thought. I am thinking about some of the students at the school I work at (high poverty, lots of ELL students). My observation has been that the kids who come in as monolingual non-English speakers ( Spanish, Twi, whatever) are more adept at switching back and forth from their language to English (once they learn it) than those whose families mix extensively. Those little 5-yr olds don’t even realize that they’re mixing and when people don’t understand them they get very confused. It seems to take them longer to get things “untangled” so to speak.

This has been a great discussion and I’m enjoying the comments drawn from all the different experiences from different cultures and countries. I’ve always seen code-switching/code-mixing as a very natural phenomenon common to all multilingual speakers. As a “developing multilingual wannabe”, I’ve code-switched and mixed both intentionally and unintentionally–usually between other bi/multilinguals and myself. I think part of the “problem” for multilinguals has been this monolingual belief that links code-switching only to “imperfect” acquisition of language. Then there’s this other “perfectionistic” belief that speakers must always be “balanced multilinguals” with a grammar-perfect, flawlessly-accented grasp of all languages utilized by the speaker! Well, that’s unrealistic and frankly, the “professional language community” tends to “create” these beliefs–which don’t correspond to real life.
Code-switching and code-mixing are not linguistic “sins” we need to repent of, nor necessarily indicators of “imperfect language learning.” Any and all human languages change and evolve over time, and words/phrases seen as “code-switching” today can be considered “common vocabulary” but a month from now. Speakers of hybrid languages–like English!–code-switch and code-mix constantly, because of the syncretistic “aggregation” which composes the lexicon of the language. If anyone bothers to analyze just these few sentences I’ve written, they will be able to separate all the Germanic, Anglo-saxon, Latin, Greek, French and “English”
words I’ve utilized…and discovered how many times I “switched the code.” Sometimes, I wish we’d just wear t-shirts that say: “I code-switch–get over it!” 🙂

Interesting! My next article is about borrowing: adopting and integrating elements form other languages, exactly what you mention in your reaction! There are similarities and differences between code-switching and borrowing. The most important similarity is that elements from two (or more) languages are used. One of the differences is that in code-switching, the characteristics of the original language are preserved. This is not always visible, or hearable, but in borrowing, the ‘new’ word usually is adapted to the pronunciation and grammar of the borrowing (or host) language.
More in my next article which will be posted within a few days or weeks.

I saw code-switching in action when I had dinner with a family in Casablanca. The whole family flawlessly switched from French to Arabic and back and the father who is tri-lingual Arabic/French/English happily included some English in the French side of the conversation for my benefit. It was wonderful to watch and made me feel much better about the mixed French/English conversations in my own home.

If you read what I wrote carefully, you will see that I do not think code mixing or switching is a “sin”. Nor do I think that all people should strive to be “balanced bilinguals”. I’m saying that you get what you pay for. Many young parents look to this site for guidance about the experience of multilingual parenting. At times, in the name of multilingual enthusiasm, there is a failure to draw the link between language input and language outcomes. Again, as long as a family is clear about that, they can and should do exactly as they please.

A book that I really like is called Raising Bilingual Children: Parents’ Guide Series. She’s SUPER pro-multilingual families, and she is also clear and realistic about outcomes based on input.

I agree with many of your key points, especially when it comes to
language models. While you do not believe code-switching is “wrong” or “sinful”, it’s very apparent that many other language professionals DO believe this–and this is stressed in books, journal articles, symposia, and the courses we take in colleges of education! All too often, the “immersion” or “target language” concepts are used to justify inhumane “techniques” to bludgeon the language learner into accepting the new language. With that said, I don’t think frequent code-switching at home is the primary reason students/speakers fail to acquire language(s) at high levels. As someone who taught ESL at the high school level–and an observer of American speech habits–I’ve become convinced that most Americans need ESL; or at least some pointers about diction and grammar! 🙂 Many American youngsters have poor, sloppy speech/writing habits–modeled by parents (who never corrected their offspring’s speech or writing!), peers, celebrities, news reporters, pop singers/rappers and sports stars–all of whom split verbs twenty ways from Sunday, confuse adjectives with adverbs, utilize tired phrases, and mispronounce any word longer than two syllables. Mom and Dad cannot speak a coherent sentence or punctuate it correctly–so how can they correct their children? Resistance to correction of language typically begins with parents–who may never have really “learned” the mother tongue in any formal academic sense, and are resistant to correction of their own speech and/or writing. We language teachers are often told not to “over-correct” our students, and admonished that we should do more “modeling” of correct speech.
This lack of direct correction (in the name of avoiding “over-correction”) also contributes to poor language skills, and resistance to learning. Students who don’t get corrected today will be more resistant to correction tomorrow or next week, when you attempt to teach another concept that builds upon what you taught yesterday. This “learning resistance” transfers to the acquisition of any OTHER language; and when you already believe that “only English” or “only our national language” should be spoken, taught or learned, you will then take shortcuts and imperfectly learn any new target language because, after all, I “only need to know English/my national language.” When these kids (or their parents) code-switch/mix, they are transmitting partially-formed “fragments” of codes they never really learned in the first place. When someone (usually a monolingual or maybe a multilingual “professional”) hears these speakers, the assumption is often made that “code-switching” is a linguistic “error” (rather than a natural speech phenomenon common to multilinguals) that “caused” the speakers to speak their languages poorly or in a fragmented manner. Most likely the “imperfect” code-switcher
is simply applying the same “short-cut system” for all the languages
being employed–complete with pronunciation, grammatical and syntactic errors in all the languages spoken. If you listen to multilinguals who have attained intermediate-to-advanced levels
of fluency in their languages, you will hear “code-switches”
that employ grammatical rules; correct or nearly-correct pronunciation of words; typical idiomatic expressions; and syntatic phrasing that reflects the “normal” or “standard” of each language utilized, regardless of the form–intra or inter-sentential–of the spoken code-switch. Most of the readers of this forum tend to be college-educated and will most likely train their offspring to learn all their languages to high levels of competency/fluency.

You are certainly correct that anyone who has the know-how to find Multilingual Living is probably a capable person in many regards.
I belong to an email listserv for multilingual families, though, and it is not uncommon to have parents express disappointment about their child’s language level; for instance, that the child understands but doesn’t speak. Or, that they visited their home country and their child wasn’t able to communicate with relatives because they only know how to “mix”.
I feel sad for these parents’ disappointment; not because I hold them or their children to any kind of perfection standard but because it usually turns out that the parents hadn’t fully realized that their children weren’t going to obtain a level of language competence superior to what they had been exposed to. The parents “mixed” at will in the home environment but thought that, somehow, their children would be able to “unmix” at the right time.
It’s really about having realistic expectations. I want young parents to know that exposing their children to another language or languages is like eating vegetables – any amount is great and more is better. AND there will be a relationship between the amount and quality of language exposure your child receives and the amount and quality language of language mastery they obtain. I think that’s only fair.

Ahhh…now I understand more fully the background to your discussion! You make several good points about parental expectations…I knew a Brazilian parent who told me that she had graduated as an English major at a university in Brazil. She related that, although her daughter was born here in the USA, she had only spoken Portuguese to her daughter at home, and never bothered to teach her child any English! (She never told me why she didn’t teach her daughter English, and I don’t think she herself really knew why she didn’t teach the child any English.) When the daughter showed up at Kindergarten, of course she had no idea what was going on, had trouble adjusting to school, had to have ESL instruction, went through a prolonged “silent period”, etc. I was astounded that her mother hadn’t taught her any simple verbal commands, phrases, words…and more astounded that she had not taught her to read and write in Portuguese! I also know a Puerto Rican family in which all the US-born kids were never taught any English at home, nor taught to read and write in Spanish. They told me the same thing–kindergarten was a big shock, they had to go to ESL classes, etc. They didn’t get a chance to become literate in Spanish until they entered high school. I don’t understand why parents “forbid” the host country language, then don’t teach or emphasize literacy in the heritage language. This practice of “forbidding” the host country language in the household seems counter-productive (and based upon fear of the host country language “taking over” the household)–especially since these same parents then turn around and demand that their children translate for them at school, the doctor’s office, the supermarket, at the lawyer’s or social worker’s office–when Mami, Papa, Abuelita or Sittee can’t handle it! These children/adolescents then have to get involved in adult matters that they should NOT be entangled with–and they often lack the adult vocabulary needed to accurately translate and convey business, health or legal information with authority figures in the community. Then the parent is essentially at the mercy of their child, who feels very pressured to be the family “ambassador-liason” to the outside world. When I lived in New Jersey, I had Puerto Rican, Dominican and Haitian neighbors. The Puerto Rican-Dominican family had a little girl, whom I spoiled “como la madrina” with English, Spanish and bi-lingual books. I told my neighbor to make sure “mi aijadita” Leilanys learns both languages and learns to read and write Spanish. The mother was always grateful for my “regalitos” and now that Leilanyis is in pre-school, she is fully bilingual and teaching her baby brother English. I would often converse with her in Spanish and read to her in Spanish (and English)–and was always amused to watch her choose which language she was going to use to converse with me; it’s a mystery to me what goes on in that little pre-school head! Her mother informed me that Leilanys adores her little books, will often pull them out, and demand to be read to. I think it’s important for parents to encourage literacy in all languages in the home–as well as the host country language. I would always encourage my ESL students to maintain high levels in their home languages–and I noticed that improvement in the L1 led to improvement in English as well. I think more parents need
to make sure their kids are learning the heritage language
right along with learning the host country language….and
literacy is a key to maintaining heritage language–just like
literacy is the key to mastery of the host country language(s).

I was brought up monolingual, and learned my second language attending school. Our children are trilingual, and I have seen them code-mix from a young age, because certain words are easier to pronounce in one language or the other. Sometimes the child will juxtapose one grammatical system with the words of the other. Great unique insight into how the mind works while learning.

I don’t code switch/mix much with my husband or the kids, and we try to insist that a sentence has to be in one language. They can alternate languages with every sentence, so this way things are slightly less confusing…

My kids know English and Italian. They switch often unintentionally even within one sentence. They can explain things in English, but if an argument, for example arises, it quickly goes to Italian. Funny, I like that in them. I actually encourage that in them, while also encouraging them to remember the way they need to say something in the other language. They are learning to communicate in two languages. What is not to like about that? but… I am not so merciful to myself. I grew up with Spanish around me, but was very sensitive to the criticisms against Spanglish, which is often spoken in my PR home. Part of that was due to things I heard as a kid from other Spanish speakers or monolinguals, that Spangish was low, used by the uneducated… This caution and insecurity has kept me from sharing this part of myself with my kids. I have focused mostly on English and Italian with them as they are the two most practical languages they need to know as we live in Italy, and all of my family is in the States. Now, I see that my kids really love the idea of learning Spanish, and I am really seeing the value of that. I am inching past my own ingrown insecurities so that I can share this part of me with them. It is an interesting development, and I am truly glad for it!! What is wrong with me being proud of my heritage, even if it mixes languages? nothing… it speaks of a people determined to leave what they new to make a better life (my great grandparents from Spanish Islands, my grandparents from PR) for their family. It speaks of history of hard work to pass on something better to children (my parents) and grandchildren (me, my siblings, and cousins). It is real life. I value good, true, well-spoken language as much as the next person, but… with all the culture switching, intermarriages, and all, it sure makes things easier to know that it is okay to say. “Hola, Come va?, I am well”

What a bummer that you were made to feel so bad about Spanglish! My siblings and I are fluent speakers of Spanglish; it’s kind of like our secret language sometimes since we have a unique way of mixing. The PR is definitely a place where Spanglish is the lingua franca and one could get on very well speaking only Spanglish there.

I keep trying to say that I don’t want my remarks taken as a slam on mixing. My thoughts are limited to language acquisition, not mature speakers and my point is very simple: Have clear expectations. Language acquisition is not immune from the law of cause and effect; what you put in is what you’ll get out. And if you’re happy with that, so am I.

Interesting discussion, and thank you for posting the article. This is something I am drawn to as I am bilingual, Portuguese/English, and I code-switch all the time. Now, there is one interesting feature to my bilingualism: I express different emotions in different languages. I tend to express grief and sadness in Portuguese, and anger and happiness in English. I was wondering why that is and if there is something going on that can account for that. I think the answer is purely emotional.

Thank you so much for posting this article. It is very interesting how you maintain your discussion of code switching between Languages. Code switching might be considered in many ways as an unconscious transference from one Langauge to another. However, some studies also proves that some bilingual are completely aware of their usage of code switching .
Code switching is one of the linguistic issues that has attracted a plenty of researches and linguists, and I’m one of them. I’m writing my masters thesis about CS and if any one interested about English – Arabic code switching .. I’ll be pleased to share any informations or resources on my email anahmg25@hotmail.com